Send Your Replies About "Strange Experiences" to Mary et al

Hello, Mary et al.

Here's my take on your Q:

Medical responses - I didn't notice any dramatic physical differences but I suspect that some personalities had different glasses prescriptions. Sometime my glasses would be great and other times I would take them off but pretty much all of us wore them. What I did find out was once I took an MMPI test and the results came out that my answers were more in line with a male instead of the female that I am. That would make sense since I know the personality that took the test was a male.

Electrical disturbances? You bet ya. Whenever I'm upset or frustrated about something and usually tired too, something electrical won't work whether it's the computer, laptop, phone, VCR will go out. This increases the frustration level and then something else will die. The more I get frustrated the more things won't work. It's a vicious circle until I see that all the electrical things are on the fritz again and can calm down and be rational about seeing what's wrong. Sometimes all I have to do is get a good night's sleep and then try again in the morning and poof they work. Sometimes it takes a few days before I get everything working again. I have recently tried experimenting with other solutions like burning sage in the house and doing some cleansing work. I've been integrated for a bunch of years too but I also saw this in a friend who was also multiple. I saw things jump off of tables all on their own at her place. So I do suspect this is something connected to us in particular. It doesn't always happen when I'm upset so I am skeptical as to whether it would be measurable scientifically or not.

Good luck finding out more!

Heather

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Hi Mary et al

I'm kate e. and the host of our DID system which goes by kellen&co. This question hit at exactly the right time!

First, as to medical/physical conditions, I have diabetes. When diagnosed the doctors could not figure out why I was still alive when my glucose levels were reading over 1,000. I think it must have been spread out over many parts of us because we were working and driving, etc. and obviously still walking around. Glad to say it's under control now but took a long time. Still there are times when it goes haywire for no apparent reason and I think it has to do with stress, and not always "my" stress, but rather that of others inside. We also had 4 strokes in Mar. of 2008 and they weren't the TIA type. They actually left visible signs of damage able to be seen in the PET scan, yet in a few months we nothing left but a few tingles in our toes, fingers, and lips on the right side of our body. Others inside say they didn't have any effects from it and I have to say there were times we got around perfectly fine with no sense of after effects and other times we could hardly get around at all without a cane.

Then there is the electrical mess! We cannot change a halogen light bulb no matter how we try. Ergo, we quit with the halogen lamps! Regular light bulbs, even when changed while they are wrapped with a cloth or paper towel, last a few weeks at most and sometimes pop immediately, burning out. When we were still able to work (way back when) we had printers in the office that weren't laser or ink jet and you had to put in the paper and press a button to print the page you had sent to the printer. I couldn't even get near the printer to put the paper in, let alone press the start button, before it printed my page on the platen of the printer. The technician couldn't figure it out. This was in the days before we started therapy, remembered anything had happened to us, or knew about being DID. We didn't know it was us causing it to start printing by itself although I finally figured it out but not the why of it.

Last week I had a day where I knew I was not having a good time of it emotionally. Therapy was rough, inside was upset about things going on, and we sat in front of our computer talking on the phone with a friend about it and our computer, without us touching it, started with the cursor jumping around on the screen, right clicking by itself to bring up all kinds of different sub menus. I had the forum I run up on the screen and I decided maybe I needed to actually put the cursor somewhere so it would stay still. I clicked in the quick reply box to anchor it there so I could answer someone's post. Then the computer moved the cursor to regular "Reply" opening a big reply box instead of the quick one. It then closed that and began to highlight different words and links around the screen. The cursor didn't move across the screen, but jumped from place to place. It then clicked on a link that took me back to the first page of the forum. Then it made my internet full page screen go to partial page and opened a minimized spreadsheet to partial screen. At that point I gave up and closed everything that was open and shut the computer down for the night.

Then I tried to use the TV. It came on to the channel I had last been watching. It almost immediately then went to "channel connections lost" with instructions that I never got a chance to try before it turned itself off. I turned it back on and it was fine other than the screen going wacko every once in awhile.

The next morning another DID friend called from out of state and my fully charged phone cut off our conversation 4 times before we both laughed and gave up. Then I found that the time was off on both my cell phone and my watch by the same amount of time.

Go figure! Actually, it kind of makes sense that when we are upset, over stimulated, or more than only me is active, that the brain, which is constantly sending out electrical impulses to run the body, might be overactive because there are more things going on with multiples than with a singleton a lot of the time. I know I actually "shock" my grown daughter all the time. I "shock" myself a lot too.

I would think this stuff would have settled down since memories started returning in Jan. of 1994 (at age 42 1/2), and we then started therapy late Feb. of 1994 and have been in therapy ever since. Now we recently turned 61 and we're still doing 2x weekly therapy and still all over the place at many times of the year due to anniversaries of abuse.

We all deserve healing. We all deserve angel wings. This I will believe.

Don't know for sure if this fits with your question but thought I'd share it anyway.

take care -
kate e. of kellen&co
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Hello Again, Mary - More "authoritative sources"

I spent some time on the web looking for info for your question about different alter-states showing up physically. Here's what I found:

One reference states: "Pitblado and Cohen (1984) studied a 32-year-old woman with a multiple personality (now called Dissociative Identity Disorder ). She had five different personalities. Pitblado and Cohen found that their patient had a different pattern of PET activation for each personality, although each personality was performing the same task in a laboratory." This reference is located here:

Another source of many different references is located here (I did not dig thru them all but some will surely be interesting to those studying the effects of trauma, early abuse, chronic PTSD, etc:

Hope that helps a bit. I'm still trying to connect with the person who posed the original Q in 2002.

Good luck & maybe we'll get more input as time goes on.

Lynn W.

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Hi Mary,

Lynn W. here again- this time another 'electrical effect' I had today! Last night, while doing the MVNews#57,
I ran into problems late at night, and had to stay up all night long (I didn't sleep--just worked remaking the online newsletter.)
I went 'to bed' at 7AM, after taking my morning medicines & chemo routine. I felt pretty decent tho, after 1.5 hrs, so I got up,
finished chores, & came to the office. My cell phone had been on the charger all night (I did that early) & worked fine
this morning. But at the office, I was feeling down because I'm SO late on the print newsletter. I was "upset".

Next thing I know, my brand new cell phone--bought for $300+ as part of my 2 yr business contract--DIED!
It wouldn't turn on no matter what I did. I use this to ring an alarm so I take some important medicine in the afternoon
so I really want it to work. & it was brand new!

I wound up having to drop my work on the newsletter to drive to the wireless store--where the guy said it was 'just the battery'.
But I knew that once I'd owned the phone two weeks, I would have to pay to replace it. It had been just 10 days.
I decided to heck with him, I wanted a new replacement phone. & I was more than a little nasty, but got it.
& (so far) it works. Maybe it was 'just the battery'...
but I think (again) it was my force-field of being upset. Who knows? Is anyone measuring this stuff? Does anyone have answers?
Lynn W.

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Hi Mary,

Yes, physical changes between states of consciousness or alters are possible. I have been integrated nearly
a decade, but my eyes still shift color when my emotions shift dramatically - primarily with happiness or sadness.
I know what you are talking about though- and yes, those differences are quite amazing and curious!

As for "electrical effects," one of my siblings cannot wear a watch. The watch goes dead immediately.
It is just the way its been for years. This sibling is in martial arts and very focused. But I really think that this
is likely the result of rage - in other words suppressed energy. Just a guess. I'm no scientist! There's still so
much we don't understand!

Thanks for asking such interesting questions!

me

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Dear Mary et al,

My own experiences--especially the electrical variety--parallel yours. My computers & printers go wacko whenever I'm on a deadline or am emotionally upset. In the long-ago past, there was a radio in our basement garage that would suddenly "come on" very loudly, right under the bedroom...yet there was no way to get inside the garage without opening the garage door (no separate entrance) which we'd obviously hear.
My former therapist used to talk about clocks that would stop when her clients were in session with her--or their watches would go haywire for no apparent reason.

I've decided (with no way to actually test this) that the computer/printer issues arise when I create an electrical force field around me (via being upset or in a terrible hurry) and this electrical 'aura' knocks electrical apparatus for a loop. I never tried to program a VCR etc. so have no answers for that. & I never had to wear different glasses for this "inside part" or that. But I did receive a long-ago query from a dissociative man who had extreme variations in his diabetes readings, depending on which part was out. His medical doctor didn't believe him. I'm curious about this topic too. Hope we get some rich answers here - and possibly some explanation of what creates these different experiences from professionals--or skeptics.

Thanks for asking.
Lynn W.